My colleagues Chad Norman and Melanie Mathos (who have day jobs at Blackbaud) have published a new social media how-to book, 101 Social Media Tactics for Nonprofits: A Field Guide. The book is a collection of time saving tips for using social media organized into the following categories: set up, communicate, engage, fundraise, and measure. The book is based on their wildly successful presentation and deck, “50 Social Media Tactics” at the BlackBaud Conference in 2009. I was honored to be invited to write the foreword for this book.

When I started working in then embryonic field of nonprofit technology (back in 1992), my job as online network coordinator for Arts Wire (an online network patterned after the Well, but for artists) was to provide training and technical assistance to those brave artists and arts organizations who wanted to get online. When I started, I didn’t know a modem from a microwave. While I was lucky to have this front-row seat at the creation of a field (using the Internet for mission-related work), I was not a natural born techie. I was lucky to have a couple of patient geeks show me all the shortcuts and avoid wasting time.

This book is like having two very tolerant and technologically savvy friends sit down with you and share their wisdom and experience about social media tactics. Melanie and Chad have patiently and generously shared their best secrets and time-saving tips to help nonprofits quickly implement social media. Aside from the great step-by-step “cheat sheets,” the book also profiles stories from 113 nonprofit organizations to illustrate the techniques.

You might have some concern that a book would be out of date as soon as it was published – and while the specifics of tips may change – it is useful to a good check list of tips handy. Also, Melanie and Chad are terrific bloggers and often share really great practical information about new developments. Take this terrific guest post by Melanie over at Frogloop blog about Pinterest, for example.

I wish Melanie and Chad great success on the launch of their book and thank them for inviting me to part of it in a small way and also a huge thank for their generous contribution to my favorite charity - Sharing Foundation in my honor!